


Just Like a Movie

by howardently



Category: My Mad Fat Diary
Genre: F/M, Fake Dating
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-01
Updated: 2017-06-01
Packaged: 2018-11-07 14:24:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11060847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/howardently/pseuds/howardently
Summary: Finn's gotten himself into a bit of a jam, and now he needs Rae to pretend to be his girlfriend for a few days.





	Just Like a Movie

“What’s up with you today?” She asks, taking a sip of her coffee and hissing as it burns her lip. “You’re all twitchy.”

His order isn’t up yet, so he jangles the coins in his pockets for something to do with his hands. He is twitchy. He’s nervous, and he hates being nervous, and he’s only just gotten over being nervous around her all the time so it’s especially jarring today.

“Right then.” He turns to face her square on. Rae’s eyes get wide over the lid of her cup. She’s blowing into the hole in the top, but he tries to unfocus a little when he looks at her mouth- it’s one of the tactics he’s developed for his nervousness around her.

“Whoa buddy.” She mutters, and he knows it’s supposed to diffuse the situation, make him laugh a little. It doesn’t. He jangles his change harder.

“Look, I need to ask you a favour. A weird favour. But it has to be you, so…”

“Okay.” Rae looks alarmed now. The barista calls his order and it’s a relief to take a break from the moment and walk over to pick up his cup. When he turns back towards her, Rae offers, “Maybe we should sit.”

“Sit, yeah.” He can bounce his knee under the table and she won’t even be able to see. She steers them to a table in the middle of the busy shop, and he nods as he looks around. This is good. Busy will help with the weird.

“So?”

“Um, so, my Dad’s coming into town on Friday.” Good start, factual, steady. “And he’s bringing his girlfriend and they’re staying at mine for the weekend.”

“That sounds nice. Right?” Rae shakes her head, then sweeps her hair over a shoulder. “What’s the weird favour? Do you need me to distract the girlfriend for an afternoon or something? Cause I’m not really good with adults.”

“No, it’s not that.” He assures her hurriedly.

“Oh good.” She laughs then, and he can practically see her shoulders loosen. She sips her coffee.

While her mouth is busy, he lets it all out in a rush. “Ineedyoutopretendtobemygirlfriend.”

He half expects her to sputter, do one of those spit takes that people on TV do. It’s a TV-ridiculous request, after all. But Rae just finishes her swallow, sets the cup down very precisely, arches an eyebrow and asks, “Excuse me?”

He lets himself breathe before he repeats it. “I need you to pretend to be my girlfriend.” She angles her head, tilts her ear towards him like she can’t quite hear. “Just for a few days, while they’re here.”

“Um…” she frowns, one of those big expressions that takes up her whole face. Then it turns into a goofy sort of knowing grin. “And why would I do that?”

“Because you’re a super cool girl who wants to help out a friend?”

She laughs then, a cheerful chuckle that causes something in him to unclench slightly. He nearly smiles back at her. But then she asks, “I mean, why do you need me to do that?”

He’s not really sure if he was blushing before, but he definitely is now. He rubs at his ear uncomfortably, moves his plastic cup around the table. “Er, I kinda told my Dad I had a girlfriend here in London.” His ear is actually itchy, it’s so full of embarrassed blood. “He worries, you know? And I couldn’t really afford to go back for New Year’s, so… I told him I stayed here with, uh, my, uh girlfriend.”

Rae rests her chin on her hand, fingers unsuccessfully attempting to hide her smile. “I see.”

“It just seemed easier.”

“Easier.” She repeats, smug. It’s only three syllables, but she packs a lot of mockery in that word. He sinks further into his chair. “And why is it that you need ME, exactly? I can’t be the only girl you know in the city.”

He slinks a little further down, gets a little redder. “I may have shown him your picture?” He says it over his shoulder; he can’t bear to look at her.

She snort-laughs again, and when he glances over, her smile is so big that she can’t contain it by biting her lip or covering her face with a hand. Finn looks at the ceiling and sighs.

“What picture? How do you even have my picture?” She has to stop mid-question three times to laugh at him. He scowls at her, she’s enjoying this far too much. “Sorry, sorry. I just have so many _questions_.”

“Har-har. Laugh it up.”

“No, I mean, really. What picture? Why would you pick me as your fake girlfriend?” She’s still got the grin, though he can tell she’s trying to push it back. Her cheeks are a little bit flushed and her eyes are shiny.

Finn watches his fingers slip in the water ring left by his iced latte. “It’s that picture from the Libertines gig. Remember?”

“Oh yeah. That was a good picture.”

It was. She was practically glowing in it, so happy that she’d wrapped an arm around his waist in answer to the one he’d flung over her shoulder in a thoughtless moment. They’d looked, for all the world, like a couple in that picture. A happy couple, an effortless one. A perfect one. So he’d stupidly sent a copy to his Dad.

“Yeah.” He agrees dully.

“But that still doesn’t answer my question. Why me?” The laughter has drained from her voice now, but when he looks up, she’s just watching him, expressionless behind her cup.

Ah, the humiliation.

“Well, see…” He clears his throat. “When I started at the magazine, I’d just moved here and I didn’t really know anyone, and so…” He pauses to shift in his seat and move his latte. “When I’d call to tell my Dad how it was going, I of course told him about Rae from work and how we got on. And one thing led to another, so…”

He tries very hard not to think about one thing leading to another with Rae. He’s not sure he’s got the blood to spare.

“So here we are.” She says, and he can feel it hovering. The verdict.

“Here we are.”

“So how close are we?” She leans in a little bit. He takes it as a good sign. “I mean, like how long are we supposed to have been dating? What would my being your fake girlfriend entail?”

“Er, um…” How is it possible for this to keep getting worse? Oh yeah, him and his shit mouth lying and lying. He tugs at his ear again, helplessly. “I might have said we, uh, live together?”

“Live together?” Rae leans back in her seat, all the way back, crosses her arms over her chest. Not so good. “You move fast, huh? Zero to living together in less than a year. We must be quite the couple.”

“I imagine so.”

Rae looks down at her lap, the hint of a smile breaking through as she shakes her head. “So, what, I’d have to stay at your flat for the weekend? Can’t you just tell them she… I… whatever, went out of town for a bit?”

“I did that last time.” He admits, shamefully. “He’s planned this trip specially to meet you.”

“To meet me. Your girlfriend.”

“Yep.”

She laughs again, shaking her head. Her arms unfold and it’s an answer all by itself. His heart, slowed by the sheer humiliation of the conversation, picks back up again. “What about stuff? Isn’t it weird for your, er, _BOY_ flat not to have any girl stuff?”

“I bought a few things the last time he came round. Pillows, a plant, some girly shampoo. I dunno. You could bring some stuff. If you want. I mean, what you’d need for the weekend, but then some extra?” Now he’s admitting to props. If there was any chance in the deepest darkest recesses of hell that this girl might ever fancy him, it’s definitely snuffed out now.

But Rae leans back in, crosses her arms on the table top. She grins again, deviously amused. “You’re really in this deep, huh?”

He swallows. “You have no idea.”

Her mouth twists to the side. “What’s in it for me?”

“A fun time?” He offers. Rae lowers her chin and raises her eyebrows. “And my Arctic Monkeys tickets?”

She lifts her chin back up and looks him over for a long second. The impending decision hangs heavy in his head; his heart pounds painfully, blood aching in his temples. She’s blurry again, and not even on purpose.

Then she leans back with a shrug. “Alright. I haven’t got anything else on.”

—

“You can’t be serious, Rae. You hardly even know him.” Chloe says from the bed, where she’s examining her nails under the guise of helping Rae pack.

“What are you talking about? I’ve worked with him for almost a year.” Rae pokes her head out of the closet and tosses a couple of tops in the general direction of the bed.

“Yeah, but what do you even know about him? He could totally be a secret murderer or something. You don’t even know.” Chloe bends to pick up a shirt, shakes it out, sniffs, then drops it again.

“He’s my mate, Chloe.” Rae argues, emerging with a blue dress still on its hanger. “We’ve been out together, you’ve never had a problem with him before now. Right, what do you think of this one?”

Chloe cocks her head to the side as Rae holds it up against her. “It’s fine.” She waves a hand, and Rae turns towards the mirror. “You’ve never even been to his flat, and now you’re going to live there?”

“Is it parental, you think? Dad approved?” Rae sways back and forth, mouth pursed up.

“Why do you even care? It’s not like you’re his real girlfriend. You don’t need to impress his Dad.”

“I just want to look nice, is all. This is the closest I’ve been to being anybody’s actual girlfriend in a long time. Maybe I’m secretly really good at being a girlfriend and I’ve just never had the chance to give it a proper go.”

“Are you going to have to snog him and stuff? In front of his parents?” Chloe asks out of nowhere. Rae tosses the dress onto the foot of the bed and returns to the closet.

“I don’t know. I haven’t even really thought about it.”

Chloe appears in the doorway. Rae doesn’t look at her. “You’ll have to share a bedroom, won’t you? If you’re to be living together? It’s not like you can sleep on the couch.”

“Honestly, I don’t know, Chlo.” Rae retorts, letting annoyance bleed into her voice. “It’s not like we had a meeting about the rules. He just asked me and I said yes. As a favour.”

“Don’t you think you should have a meeting about the rules?” Chloe is infuriatingly sensible as she begins to flick through the hangers. “A conversation, at least. What if he expects you to be his girlfriend in _all_ the ways? What if he expects, you know, nookie?”

Rae spins then, “Nookie?”

“Well, yeah. You can’t know what he wants from you unless you ask him.” Chloe arches an eyebrow perfectly; it’s an expression she’s had lots of practice at.

“Yeah, but nookie?” Rae laughs. “Can’t you just call it sex, like a normal person?”

Chloe pulls a face and turns back to the clothes. “Fine then, what if he expects sex?”

“Well, it would be a… bonus. Who knows, maybe I’m secretly really great at that too, and all I need is an opportunity to put it into practice.” Rae lets her eyes get wide, makes a lusty swivel of her hips.

Chloe rolls her eyes, pulling a hanger off the shelf. “This one.” She shoves the dress at Rae. “Very parental. Hope you don’t get murdered in it.”

Rae examines the garment as Chloe leaves the room. Black, knee length, short sleeves. Not bad. She shrugs and adds it to the pile on the bed.

“Love you too, babes!” She calls towards the hallway. Chloe’s door thunks shut.

—

“Okay, they’re supposed to get in at five, but I told him we were working, so we just need to meet them at the restaurant at six.”

“Well, hello Finn. Nice to see you too.” Rae snipes as she slides into the booth and pulls off her jacket.

He cringes. Great, he’s already screwing this up. He’s supposed to be nicer to her, really nice like a proper boyfriend. He can hardly remember what that’s like. Man, it’s going to be a long weekend.

“Sorry. I’m just nervous.”

Rae looks up from the paper menu and gives him a soft smile. “Don’t worry so much. It’ll be fine. Well, as long as you stop acting so twitchy. Give it a rest.”

Below the table, her foot slides against his jittering leg. It’s hardly more than a brush of shoe over denim, but something about it feels intimate. His ears go red, but his leg stops moving. Rae smiles again and drops her eyes back to the menu.

“I ordered for us.” His voice is a little rough, so he clears his throat. “You like cheese and Branston, right? That’s your sandwich?”

“Yeah,” she sounds surprised, “thanks. You didn’t have to do that.”

He waves her thanks away. “It’s no big deal. I’m your boyfriend, remember?”

“Yeah, about that…”She starts, averting her eyes.

He panics. His Dad’s going to be there in a matter of hours. She can’t back out now. He grabs her hand from where it rests on the tabletop, holds it between both of his. “Please don’t change your mind, Rae. Please. I know this is crazy, but I really need you.”

“It’s not that.” She flushes, makes some breathy mumbles as she gently pulls her hand away, slipping both hands under the table. Panic still floods him, making his heart thud hollowly and his lungs feel tight. She won’t look at him. “It’s just. Um, maybe we should talk about the rules?”

“Rules?”

“Like expectations. For, uh, touching and stuff.” She clears her throat, still blushing and looking everywhere but at him.

“Oh. Well, it’s your show here. You’re doing me the favour. So, whatever you want.” It’s so strained and uncomfortable. How on earth are they ever going to pull this off?

She shakes her head, eyes rolling upwards. It’s such a familiar move, such a Rae face, that despite the situation he finds himself smiling.

“We’re going to have to touch each other, if we’re supposed to be dating. Right?” She asks with a touch of condescension.

 It’s then that the server appears, a puzzled expression on his face as he sets a tray down on the table in front of them. “Number 42?”

Finn pulls the receipt from his pocket and waves it, lips curled up unpleasantly.“Cheers, mate.”

Rae’s eyes are on him, so he busies himself dividing the sandwiches and drinks between the two of them. She takes an audible breath.

“Are you, like, a cuddler?” He looks up then; she’s very pink. “I mean, are you normally very affectionate with your girlfriends?”

He unwraps his sandwich as he ponders, he’s never thought about it before. He thinks of Stacey, of the way her shoulder was the perfect size to cup in his palm, the way her elbow always stuck into his ribs.

“Sort of, yeah.”

“Okay.” She breathes, picking at the tape closing the paper wrapper of her sandwich. “So, we will have to be touchie-feelie, I guess. Didn’t you think about this? How did you plan for this to go?”

She’s exasperated, and he feels the pinch of shame once more. He will not tell her that his only plan for treating her as his girlfriend was to allow himself to enact all the impulses he normally kept under wraps.

“I don’t know. I’ve never done this before. I didn’t really think any of this through, in case you haven’t noticed.” He bites back, then gentler. “I just thought I’d do whatever seemed natural.”

Rae swallows, opens her drink and takes a sip. “Sorry. I’m just trying to picture what this is going to be like. I haven’t even seen your flat. What if I walk into the wrong room or something?”

“No, you’re right. I’m sorry.” He looks at the ceiling for a moment, runs a hand through his hair. “This just got so out of hand, I’m so out of my depth. We’ll go to the flat after lunch, get you settled in. I should have thought of that. Nobody will miss us for a half a day on Friday.”

“Okay.” She’s almost meek, looking down again. “What about the bed?”

“What about the bed?” He squawks. It’s too loud, and a couple of people look up, including the curious server. His leg starts bouncing again.

“Shhh.” She hisses, blushing all the way to her hairline. “Finn.”

“Sorry.” He offers again, palms up. “What about the bed?”

“Will we be sharing it? Do you expect me to, uh, um… How do I put this? Perform the duties of an actual girlfriend? In the bedroom?” She asks, meeting his eyes boldly despite the colour on her cheeks.

He swallows, takes a hasty gulp of his water and coughs a little as it goes down wrong. “No.” He says emphatically. “No, I don’t… How can you think I’d expect…?” He rubs an eyebrow forcefully. “No. I have a sleeping bag. I’ll sleep on the floor.”

“A sleeping bag?”

He nods decisively. “On the floor.”

“Okay.” Rae concludes, finally opening her sandwich. She picks it up, and just before she takes a bite, she asks, “What about kissing?”

He chokes again. If he dies during lunch, they won’t have to do any of this, and his Dad will never know because irony of ironies, he’s out with Rae. Who is studying him from the other side of the table.

“Kissing. Um, yes. That’s… up to you. Whatever you’re comfortable with.” He takes a huge bite so that his mouth will be full for a while and he won’t have to speak.

“Hmmm. I guess we’ll see about that. See what happens naturally.” She taunts, raising her eyebrows at him.

“I hope you’re nicer to me when you’re my girlfriend.” He laughs.

“Don’t count on it.”

—

“For months after that, he was just pissin’ everywhere!” Gary’s got a big laugh, booming. “Drove his Mum up the walls!”

Rae’s cheeks hurt from laughing. Finn’s dad is fucking hilarious. He hasn’t stopped telling stories from Finn’s childhood since he’d sauntered into the flat, and the stories have only gotten more embarrassing in proportion to the number of pints he’s consumed. Their raucous laughter had drawn more than a few dirty looks at the restaurant. She loves him, absolutely loves him, there’s nothing for it.

“Dad!” Finn hisses, ears and neck and cheeks bright red. Poor thing. If she wasn’t having such a grand time, she might feel bad for him. And to think, she’d actually been nervous about all this. “Fuck’s sake! Give it a rest already.”

“His Mum had all these houseplants, tropical things from all over the place. She loved ‘em, tended ‘em like they were her babes. She couldn’t figure out why they were all suddenly dying, every single one. She bought all these books, went to a bleedin’ seminar down at the garden centre. She just couldn’t keep them alive, no matter what she did.” Gary leans over, holding the punch line, drawing it out.

Rae grins. Beside her on the sofa, Finn puts his head in his hands. She gives him a sympathetic pat on the back, but gestures for Gary to continue regardless.

“Then one morning, she wakes up early, hearing a bump or something. And she comes out to find Finny here, proud as a peacock, moving from one plant to another and giving them all a good watering with his little willie!”

Finn emerges from his hands to scowl. “Seriously, old man. And you wonder why I didn’t let you meet her before today!”

She can’t help but smile warmly at him, at them both. This whole evening has been a perfect golden bubble of delight. Who’d have known that being a fake girlfriend was so much fun? “It’s a good thing we’re already together. With all these stories, I might have gone off ya.”

 She rubs a hand back and forth across his back familiarly, while he blinks up at her. Finn’s not been great about the physical stuff, most likely forgetting in his embarrassment, so it’s been up to her to make sure to play the part for both of them. It helps that he’s so touchable- lots of warm, firm expanses to rub casually. And the beer, that’s helped too. She’s had more than she’d intended, more than she should have probably. But it’s just been so easy, like laughing with a mate over a pub table.

A half beat late, Finn scrunches his face up at her in a mocking grimace. She laughs and reaches a hand to squish his cheeks together and make his lips purse. It’s not something she’d normally do, ever, even if the thought had occurred to her a time or two. But the rules are different today. And maybe just a little sloshy. It’s hard to say.

“Well.” Gary clears his throat.

She drops Finn’s face instantly, her own cheeks burning. He reaches up to rub his jaw, but she deliberately doesn’t look. Her blood pounds behind her ears as a hot rush of shame thrums through her. She’s already gotten carried away, day one. _Shit._

Finn’s Dad is smiling though, maybe even grinning. He glances at his watch. “It’s getting late, I think I’ll call it a night.”

“Oh, really?” She looks around for a clock, but she doesn’t see one easily and gives up before he notices. “What time is it?”

“After ten. Probably not late for you, but it’s past the bedtime of this old geezer.” He stands up, holds his arms out to her. “C’mere.”

She smiles as he wraps his arms around her, even manages to tighten her own arms a bit around his back. She’s not much of a hugger, but this is not bad at all.

“You’re even better than I expected, Rae. And that’s saying something, with all the things Finny has to say about you.”  He says as they pull apart.

Rae laughs, darting a quick glance towards Finn. He shrugs uncomfortably.

“You too, Gary. Finn never told me what a proper laugh you are.”

“You wound me, son.” Gary teases, holding a hand over his heart. Finn rolls his eyes.

“Goodnight, Dad.”

Gary slings an arm around his neck, gives him a jostling kiss on the cheek. Rae feels it again, that fizzy happiness, that warm sense of belonging. She shakes her head, takes a deep breath. _Not real_ , she tells herself firmly. _Don’t get carried away, none of this is real._

As soon as the guest room door is shut, Finn collapses onto the sofa in a sprawl. It takes Rae aback for a moment, his wide spread legs, loose neck, extended arms. It’s such a male pose, foreign and strange to someone who has never spent much time in the living rooms of boys. She can’t help but stare with a kind of anthropological curiosity. What’s he like when no one else is around? It occurs to her that with the exception of this afternoon, when he’d shown her the flat and they’d both been on their very best company behaviour, they’ve never been alone together before.

After a moment, Finn raises his head and gives her a curious look, then pats the couch beside him. She folds herself down, conscious of her stiffness, her closed body language, but not sure what to do about it.

“Well.” He sighs. “That went well.”

She can’t tell if he’s being sarcastic, if he’s annoyed or affronted or what. She’s all tense in her shoulders, embarrassed about screwing it all up with her grabby hands.

“Sorry.” She shakes her head, looking up. Somebody upstairs is walking around, soft thuds against the ceiling. “I shouldn’t have squished your face like that. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“What?” He turns his whole body towards her. “No, it was perfect, you were perfect. I think it went really well.” When he smiles at her then, all loose and open, it unknots the pressure behind her collarbones. “He definitely likes you. But then, how could he not?”

“Oh.” She can’t think of what to say. What does that mean? There’s lots of reasons that someone might not like her, as people have always been so quick to point out. Maybe he just means because she’s mostly just imaginary, just a lie come to life. Fantasy borrowed for a week. The thought makes her feel both flattened and immeasurably light.

“I think this is going to work.” He grins and reaches over her for the remote. “We might actually have fun.”

—

“How’s it going down there?” Rae’s amused voice drifts over the side of the bed and down to where he is practically writhing on the floor. She always sounds amused; doesn’t anything faze her? He rolls again.

“Just getting comfortable.” He grunts back.

Her pale face joins her voice hanging over the bed. “And how’s that going for ya?”

“Good.” He flips again, relieving the pressure on an elbow. “Fine.”

Rae rolls her eyes, even in the mostly dark room he can see it. “We’re both adults. We can share a bed.”

He props his head up to look at her, raising his eyebrows. “What, you’re not worried about my expectations anymore? Not worried I’m going to try and seduce you?”

He’s trying to tease, meet her always playful attitude with some of his own, but the word _seduce_ feels huge in the darkness, reverberates far beyond the confines of its syllables. He worries he’s made it weird again. He worries he’s always making things weird.

But then Rae laughs. “Nah, you’re not really the seducing kind.”

“What kind am I then?” It’s light, flippant even, but something in him cringes at the idea that she knows, that she can really see him.

“The kind who has a fake girlfriend.” She waggles her eyebrows before rolling back onto the bed.

He freezes for a moment, weighing the decision. It’s been a long time since he’s slept on the floor, obviously, and he’s forgotten that his adult body doesn’t really agree with unforgiving hard flat surfaces. He’s aching already, and it hasn’t even been an hour. How miserable will he be in the morning?

But the other option is to actually sleep with Rae in his bed. What if he gets wood? Or breathes morning breath all over her? Or sexually assaults her in his sleep? Even the best case scenario is really only that he’ll lie next to her all night, watching her dreaming while his own head refuses to shut off.

He creakily climbs up from the floor, holds his pillow at the side of the bed, watches her back. “Are you sure?”

Rae looks over her shoulder at him. “It’s fine. Really. We’re both grown-ups.” Then, as he settles onto the mattress next to her, “Besides, what would your Dad think if you were too sore to even walk in the morning?”

_Sex injury,_ he thinks immediately, but doesn’t say. If _seduce_ was a big word in a dark space, then the word _sex_ with Rae in his bed would be a nuclear bomb. Just the thought resounds in the creases of the blankets, in the cavern between their bodies on the bed. He lays flat on his back, hands on his chest, until the echoes fade and he and he can think again.

“Hey, Rae?” he asks a few minutes later, as the air starts to thicken with sleep. Rae mumbles wordlessly in reply. “I’m definitely the seducing kind. Just for the record.”

It’s silent for a while, and he thinks she might be asleep. But then she rolls over, tucks both of her hands beneath her cheek and says with a smile in her voice, “Oh yeah? Let’s have it, then.”

It was a stupid move, he can see that now. Part of him really wants to give it a shot, to run a hand over her hip, up her arm, let it curl against her cheek. To tell her he wants her, that she’s beautiful and clever and so quick she spins his head. Finn shakes his head against the dangerous idea, and instead levers himself up on an elbow and raises an eyebrow dramatically.

“Hey baby, how you doin’?” He puts on his best Joey Tribianni voice, makes a little kissing gesture.

Rae shakes her head, scrunches her nose. “That was terrible. I stand by my original judgment.”

He tries not to feel deflated as he plops back down. She didn’t even laugh.

The bed shifts beneath her as she moves, and it reminds him vaguely of the waterbed his parents had when he was very little. How long has it been since there’s been a girl in his bed? He struggles to remember, so it has to have been a long time.

He knows it’s a bad idea, but he lets himself imagine what it would be like to have Rae in his bed for real. Would she curl a leg over his and smile up at him? Would she retreat back to her side to wrap herself in the sheets, suddenly shy? Would he prop himself up and kiss her again and again? Would he wrap her up in his arms and not let go?

His soft fantasy starts to melt into dreams, the easy slide from wondering into happening. The Rae in his subconscious looks at him differently, and she’s all mouth in a way that he’ll be thinking about for weeks to come.

 “Can I ask you something?” Real Rae whispers. It’s soft, hesitant, and it takes a moment to pull him gently back to reality. He lifts his eyelids and finds her wide eyed and still. Something about her expression makes him want to smile.

He rolls to his side, facing her. “Sure.”

“What happened with your mum?”

He’s quiet for a moment, the way he always is when he thinks about his Mum. It always takes a minute to get beyond the great gaping chasm inside him shaped like her. It’s strange, he almost forgets it’s there, normally. He goes about his life, feeling fine, feeling whole. Then someone says her name, and he’s standing on the edge of his own emptiness.

“I wouldn’t ask,” Rae says quickly. “It’s just, I don’t want to say the wrong thing.”

“It’s fine.” He tries to reassure her with a fleeting smile, but he has to look over her shoulder to answer. “She and my Dad divorced when I was seven or eight, I don’t remember exactly. It was okay, at first. She moved just a couple streets down and I split time between them. After a year or so, just when I had gotten used to things, she met this Portuguese guy. They got married pretty quickly after that. They went to Portugal for the honeymoon, and she never came back.”

“Never?” She whispers. When he looks at her again, her eyes are otherworldly.

“Nope.” He takes a deep breath, tries to exhale the tightness in his chest that always comes when he thinks of her. “She’s got a whole new family down there now. I’ve got two sisters I’ve never met. They speak three languages.”

He chokes back a bitter laugh. It gets quiet again. Finally Rae says, “That’s shit. I’m sorry.”

He wishes then that she was his real girlfriend, that he could let his cracks show, that she would hold him together for a bit. She’s so close, and it would take so little to reach out and touch her.

“What about you? What’s your family like?” He asks instead.

“Doesn’t really matter, does it? You can just make something up.” She’s brusque, and after talking about his Mum, it stings more than it should.

He blinks, swallows. His voice is gruff when he answers, “We’re friends, aren’t we?”

She pulls her head back, just a fraction, but he knows she can tell he’s hurt. One of her hands moves out from under her face, tucks the pillow underneath her to see clearer. “Yeah. We are. Sorry.” She takes a deep breath. “Same sort of stuff, really. My dad left when I was little. Mum told me he moved to Scotland. He would send me postcards every couple of months, little bits of advice. When I was in college, I found out that it was really my Mum the whole time. He lived on the other side of town and just never wanted to see me.”

He doesn’t know what to say. He knows exactly how that must have hurt, how having one of the people who is supposed to love you unconditionally not give a shit can unseat your whole life, make you doubt everything. He wonders what her emptiness looks like, how big it looms in her head.

Eventually he offers, “That’s shit. Sorry.”

Rae huffs an almost laugh, lifts a hand to wave it away. “It’s alright. My Mum got married again a few years ago, and my stepdad is really great. And now I have a little sister. So it worked out okay.”

She lets him look at her for a bit, and he watches as she shrugs the sadness off and returns to the cheerful Rae he knows so well.

“I guess there are still happy endings then.” He says, and she smiles in return.

 “What about your Dad? Do you think he’ll get married again?”

 “I dunno. I thought he might, but now that he’s broken up with Carol…” He lets out a long breath, chews on his bottom lip for a bit. It’d been a complete surprise when his Dad had shown up without his girlfriend that afternoon. When he’d asked about her, Gary’d only shrugged and mumbled, _‘wasn’t meant to be._ ’

“Were they together a long time?”

“Six months, thereabouts.”

“Not even as long as us.” She teases, and Finn laughs quietly into the darkness. It’s perfect, lying in bed and laughing with her. He suddenly feels painfully lonely. “Do you think he’s sad about it?”

He can’t breathe for a second as her words align with his heartache. He has to forcibly pull himself out of his emotions, out of himself, to consider his dad. “He doesn’t seem sad.” Rae nods. Her eyes glitter in the low light. “But I don’t know.”

He sighs then, flops onto his back. “When I was little, he used to say that Nelson men only ever love one woman. He definitely loved my Mum.”

It goes quiet again as her absence looms heavy in the flat. He doesn’t think about her much, because it’s all doom and gloom like this. All the things that can’t be, things that are hopeless and futile and bleak. She can’t have ruined them both forever, surely.

“Have you ever loved anyone?” Rae asks, so softly that he’s not sure she means him to hear. He rolls again to face her.

She’s so pretty, all contrasts. Her hair is loose, and he wants so much to run his fingers through it. How far do the fake girlfriend rules go? Could he get away with it? He wishes the word love wasn’t in the air; he’s never liked it much.

“No. Never even come close really.” He gives in then, reaches over to pick up a strand of hair to rub between his fingers. “You?”

Rae moves just a little, though he couldn’t say how. Her lips curve, soft like the gray of the room. “Just Jazz. My sister. I don’t think I even really knew what love was ‘til Jazz.”

“Hmmm.” He mutters, still watching as his thumb glides over the ribbon of hair caught in his palm. After a minute, she lifts a hand to pull the lock away.

“Goodnight, Finn.” She breathes. Her eyes are hypnotizing; he has to blink and look away.

“Goodnight Rae.”

She rolls until her back is to him and goes still.

—

In every imagining she’s had of this weekend, they go to Piccadilly Circus. Sometimes, they’d go to the British Museum in the afternoon, or wait in the interminably long queue to ride the Eye. But always Piccadilly.

It’s stupid, really. They’re not tourists. She and Finn actually live in London, and it’s not like Gary’s never been there before. It’s probably due to the romantic comedies Izzy’s always bringing by, the ones she begrudgingly loves. What else happens to people in a fake dating story but a movie montage of tourist sites?

Instead, they spend a drowsy, warm morning in the flat. She sleeps in late, and by the time she’s up, Finn’s showered and making breakfast, so there’s no awkward waking up together. They eat omelets at his little kitchen table with the sunlight streaming down, and Finn’s somehow made her tea exactly how she likes it. She drinks three cups. Afterwards, Finn and Gary play a video game, sitting side by side on the couch in an almost identical pose. If he were her real boyfriend, she’d find it unbearably cute and she’d feel the glow, and she’d watch them and bite her thumb lingeringly while wearing a low-slung, too big sweater and think about how happy and lucky she was.

It’s hard to know the distinctions when you’re faking everything.

She curls up in an armchair with a book and after an uncomfortable few pages of being painfully aware of them, loses herself. It’s an infinitely better morning than she’d planned for, particularly since she’s a tad hung over and all those crowds would have been torture. When Finn walks down the hall, he squeezes her socked foot where it hangs over the arm of her chair and smiles at her. Man, he’s got a lot of different smiles and so many of them are good ones.

She thinks about it every time he touches her, then scolds herself for thinking about it. _You don’t actually feel it_ , she reminds herself. She doesn’t usually have to work this hard to filter out the true things from the muddle of her feelings, but the thickness of the false relationship makes it harder to sift. She’s not working at it, not forcing this pretend thing to feel real. It just does, all on its own. So what’s a real feeling, and what’s just circumstantial?

After a while, Gary gets frustrated with the game and Finn’s relentless superiority and it’s decided that they’ll go out. Rae follows Finn back to his bedroom to get sweaters, watches as he sits on the edge of the bed to put his boots on. His gray t-shirt strains over his back when he hunches over, and she gets stuck on it somehow, frozen just staring until he glances over a shoulder and gives her a curious smile. When she spins to tug on her own sweater, there’s a suspended moment as the fabric tunnels over her head where her thoughts swirl and spin, circling around that gray t-shirt. _How soft is it?_ She wonders. _How would it feel to slide her palms over his back, rest a cheek over the cotton below his collar bone?_

When she emerges, she makes sure to put all that away. They’ve got to save that kind of stuff for in front of Gary. There’s no point to it otherwise.

They walk down to the cinema. Finn holds out his hand on the sidewalk in front of the building. She glances at Gary before she takes it, but by the time they make it to the ticket booth, it doesn’t feel like a performance anymore. It just feels like them, like it’s always been that way. The three of them bicker cheerfully about what movie they’ll see, and then Finn and Gary bicker about who’ll pay. She laughs easily, laughs frequently. It feels like a movie again.

In the snack bar line, she shivers when Finn moves in close, brushing her hair back over a shoulder to whisper right up against the shell of her ear. He only wants to know what she orders, to keep up the ruse that they’ve been to dozens of movies, but it’s shockingly intimate and she isn’t quite prepared. When she dips her head to hide her flush, he follows and angles his face into the crook of her neck. He doesn’t slide his lips against her skin, but it’s there anyway, the thought heavy in the air. If she closes her eyes, leans in just a bit…

She puts a hand on his chest as she pulls back, smiles up at him. She doesn’t look at Gary, but she can seem him in her peripheral vision.“Just a Coke.”

Finn’s eyes are dark and he doesn’t smile back, just nods.

After the lights go down in the theatre, he puts a stiff arm over her shoulders. By the time the third car blows up, she’s leaned in against his chest and his arm has gone soft and pliant around her.

—

She’s singing in the shower. Or almost singing? She’s pretty quiet, since she doesn’t know how thick the walls are here. But she can’t not sing. It would be criminal to be this warm and relaxed and content and not sing in the shower.

Plus, Finn’s shower is about 300% nicer than hers. She’s been in here twenty minutes already and she hasn’t had to turn the heat up once. And, his fake girlfriend shampoo is more expensive and smells better than the one she normally buys. The scent of peaches is so ripe and thick that the steam is practically tinted where it fogs the mirror.

So, yeah, she’s pretty happy in here. She’s even singing one of the non-mopey Cure songs. Chloe’d probably cheer in relief.

Over the sound of her own voice, she hears a soft _shoosh-click._ She stops singing and stills to listen, but it doesn’t come again. Tentatively, she calls, “Hello?”

“Don’t freak out.” Finn says by way of greeting.

She jumps, sending toiletries flying, but she manages to hold in her scream.

“Finn? What the hell? I’m naked in here!” She chokes out, frantically and uselessly crossing her arms over her chest.

“I know! I’m sorry. I just, I had to pee and you were in here, and my Dad was like, ‘It’s not like you’ve never seen her naked before,’ and I didn’t know what to say and I tried to tell him you haven’t lived here that long, but he just said ‘There’s a first time for everything,’ and then… Yeah, I’m really sorry.”

 He does this dumb impression of Gary when he’s relating what his Dad said, where he drops his voice all low, even though Gary’s voice isn’t any lower than Finn’s, and something about it pops the bubble of tension she’s holding. In a strange turn of events, she doesn’t get totally freaked out. It’s not a party or anything, but it’s not the end of the world, either. Huh.

There’s quiet for a minute while she processes all this confusing information. Finally, she asks with more confidence than she feels, “So, are you going to pee, or are we just hanging out?”

Another silence stretches, long enough that she’s ready to stick her head out of the shower curtain and see for herself what’s going on, until Finn makes a strange, choking sound. “I…” His voice is clogged and faltering. “Can’t right now.”

“A little gun shy, Finnley?” She laughs.

“It’s not that.”

“Then what? Just go. I’m almost done here.”

“I… uh…” He croaks, and this time, she does pop her head out, but he’s got his back to her so she can’t see his expression, just the hunch in his shoulders. They lift and then lower, and he makes a few more garbled sounds that might be an attempt at language.

“Finn?” She asks, getting a little concerned. Maybe he’s got a deformity or something.

He flinches at the sound of her voice, nearer than before, slowly spinning to face her. She’s a little taken aback because he’s bright red and looks absolutely mortified. Haltingly, he whispers, “You’re naked in there.”

“Oh.” She pulls her head back on her neck, confused and reeling with the rejection. She blinks, shakes her head… and then she sees. He’s not got his hands covering his crotch because he needs to pee so bad, he’s not five years old and doing the I-gotta-go dance. “Oh.”

Finn buries his face in his hands in shame. And then she really sees.

“Oh.” She says again, then ducks back into the shower to cover her own face, stifling her laughter. She’s pretty sure some leaks out when she teases, “I didn’t know I inspired that kind of reaction.”

“Don’t be daft, Rae.” He scoffs, sounding a tiny bit more normal.

It’s not some great profession of love, but she still feels a bit shell-shocked with it. She rinses the conditioner from her hair in a daze, caught up with his red cheeks, with the way he’d swallowed when he said naked. Finn Nelson is attracted to her. She blinks rapidly, suddenly hyper aware of the heat of the water beating against her skin, the slick of the soap bubbles pooling around her feet.

“So, I’m just going to sit here.” Finn calls. “You let me know when you’re finished and I’ll hand you a towel and um, turn away or whatever.”

Her heart is pounding now, but it’s not in the panicky way she’s used to. This is a low, heavy _thump thump thump_ , where she can feel her blood being pushed out of her chest and along her veins. Rae squeezes the rope of her hair, thinks it again just because it’s hers now, Finn Nelson is attracted to her. She feels thick, hazy.

Finn is attracted to her, and she is absolutely attracted to him.

“Okay.” She says, too soft, too dreamy, after another hot minute of letting it circle in her head. “I’m done.”

There’s a long moment after she turns off the water where nothing happens, but then Finn’s hand thrusts behind the curtain, a pale blue towel clenched in his fist. Rae finds herself staring at it dumbly, hands clasped together over her breasts, not moving to take it. It’s like she’s never seen a hand before, but then, maybe she hasn’t. Maybe she’s never in her life really looked at the curve of palm meeting wrist, at the knots of knuckles bunching under skin, at the scraggly, barely-there hairs that dust the back.

Oh God, she’s naked and Finn’s hand is impossibly sexy and she’s got a terrible impulse to rub her fingertips over his wrist and she’s so NAKED in here. Finn’s hand jiggles, reminding her to take the towel, and she snatches it away. His hand makes a retreat, slower than she thinks is strictly necessary.

She dries off swiftly, but when she goes to wrap the towel around her, she discovers it’s one of those towels. She buys beach towels, bath sheets, long luxurious lengths of terrycloth to swathe herself in so that she doesn’t have to get dressed right away. But men don’t really do that, and he’s got so much less space to cover anyway, so Finn’s towel is one of those petite little things meant for waists or waifs. She can wrap it at the top, over her breasts, but it gapes open over her hip and thigh. She’s embarrassed. She should have thought of this, of the inadequacy of a normal person’s towel. Fat girls are supposed to plan for contingencies like this one.

But, she’s also thinking of Jessica Rabbit, of the slip and slide of cartoon curvy thighs and calves. If she tilts the towel so the gap isn’t in the front, it’s only one of her smooth bits that’s exposed, only the softly sloping expanse of her side. It’s one of her good parts, one even she doesn’t have too much of a problem with. She’s got a vision of slowly lowering one foot over the side of the tub to the floor, of her towel drifting open to show her leg, of Finn’s eyes bugging out of his head as the cartoon OOO-oooo-GA sounds in the tiny bathroom.

She’s turned on, she realizes suddenly. What’s wrong with her? One tiny little glance at his cock, his fully-clothed, totally off limits cock, and she’s thinking in cartoon sex noises and wanting to parade herself in front of him. It’s gotta be that shower, that blissfully, consistently steamy shower.

Finn clears his throat, and she jumps.

“Alright, I’m coming out.” She warns soberly, peeking her head out from the curtain and glancing towards him.

He straddles the toilet back so that he’s facing the wall, even covering his eyes chastely, just to make sure she knows he’s not looking. And weirdly, she’s a little disappointed. If this were a movie, there’d be a little mirror behind him and he’d wipe away a tiny circle from the steam so that he could take a peek. She’d be bending over to rub a towel slowly up one leg or something ridiculous like that, and he’d lick his lips…

She’s just standing there. Rae shakes herself and grabs her bathrobe, tying it on over the towel. She’d worn it in, intending to change into pajamas after the shower, but there’s no way she’s going to stand there and put on the lace knickers that she’d scolded herself over but brought anyway, just-in-case. Because it doesn’t hurt to be prepared. Contingencies, and all that.

Eventually, she wrestles herself out of the towel and hangs it up on the rack. She checks in the mostly steamed over mirror, and her robe is tied tight and all her bits are in place, everything decent.

“Okay. I’m good.” She tells him, and Finn awkwardly spins around on the toilet seat without standing. His eyes are adorably wide and his cheeks painfully pink, and she can’t help but chuckle a little at him. He shakes his head, makes a silly, chagrinned sort of face at her.

“I’m just going to brush out my hair really quick,” she narrates stupidly, “it’ll tangle terribly if I don’t do it right away. It’ll only take a minute, and then I’ll get dressed in the bedroom.”

“Yeah. Cool.” He nods.

He watches her as she slowly brings the brush through her hair, unraveling knots and pulling it into straight streaks, doesn’t even bother to hide it. It can’t be particularly interesting, but it’s not like there’s much to look at in here. It’s strange to have someone watch her brush her hair, even stranger that it doesn’t feel _that_ strange. When she’s done, she gathers up her piles of clothes, and Finn clears his throat.

“It’s all yours.” She shrugs, backing out of the door and into the hallway.

“Thanks. Sorry I interrupted your shower.” He mumbles, a smile lighting his face. It’s nice, damp and comforting, relaxing like the warm steaminess of the bathroom. “I didn’t mind.” Rae smiles back, and she’s surprised to find that it’s completely true.

—

“Can I ask you something?” She chirps, lying on her back beside him in the bed. It’s a little weirder tonight, a little stiffer, and he’s one hundred percent sure of the cause. It’s a relief for her to break the silence.

“Only if it’s another round of ‘Let’s Expose Our Emotional Trauma!’” He teases, rolling onto his side so she can see that he’s smiling.

“Unfortunately not.” She shifts onto her side as well, mirroring him. “We’ll have to save that one for tomorrow.”

“Alright then, what you got?”

“Can you really not pee when you’ve got a hard-on?”She just asks it, no embarrassment, no shame. There’s a hint of teasing, maybe a faint flush on her cheeks, but still.

He, on the other hand, is choking. “Oh God, you can’t just ask that!”

“What?” She half-laughs, throwing a hand into the air. “I’m curious! I don’t have a penis, I don’t know how these things work.”

He turns his face into the pillow to groan. “I can’t answer that.”

She shakes his shoulder, grumbling his name. He laughs through his embarrassment. “Fiiiiinnnnn. C’mon, don’t be a baby. I really want to know. I may never get the chance again to ask about boner peeing.”

“You really want to know this? It won’t take away the mystique?”

Rae laughs, and it’s just such a good sound, she’s got such a great laugh. His bedroom wont be the same when she leaves and takes that laugh with her. “I’m not worried about the mystique. I really want to know.” She assures him, nodding her head earnestly. Her eyes are sparkling. “I think it’s a fake girlfriend privilege. I read it in the rulebook. We get to ask all the cock questions we’ve been dying to know.”

“Fine!” He concedes, turning back to her, grinning like an idiot even as his face is on fire. “Fine. I can pee with… when I’m… er… erect. But it’s harder.” Rae barks a ‘Ha!’ and he scowls at her. “More difficult, then. To aim and stuff.”

“Ah,” she says, and her voice is so suffused with laughter that it might actually be making the room brighter, “I see. So it’s not that you couldn’t earlier, it’s just that you didn’t want to pee all over the place in front of me?”

“I’m a gentleman, Rae.” He says solemnly. “I would never boner-pee in front of a lady.”

“But regular pee? That’s not a problem?”

“Hasn’t a boyfriend ever peed in front of you?” He taunts, enjoying this far too much.

She pulls her mouth into an affronted pout. “Yuck. No. Have you ever peed in front of a girlfriend?”

“Of course not. Yuck.” He mocks, just to get a rise out of her. It works. Rae sits up in bed, cross-legged, and slaps at his shoulder.

“You’re so gross! But then with your Dad, maybe it just runs in the family. I can’t believe he told you to just go in there and take a whizz in front of me. Isn’t he concerned about penis mystique?”

He groans again, cups a hand over each ear, flops his body around a little. “Please, Rae. Can we stop talking about penises? We’re in my bed.”

“I would have thought it would be a familiar topic of conversation, here in your bed.” Her voice is teasing, wry. “What, do the girls you usually have over not ask about your erections?”

He can’t think of anything to do but groan. She’s killing him, seriously.

Rae claps both hands over her face. “Wait, forget I said that. Just, yeah. Sorry. No.” She flops back down onto her back, ramrod straight as she stares at the ceiling.

He rises up onto an elbow to laugh down at her. “That’s the thing that’s too far? You’ve got no problems with ‘Oh Finn, tell me how you pee when you’ve got a hard on?’” He imitates in a goofy falsetto that sounds nothing like her. “But that was too much?”

“Shut up.” She grunts, rolling her eyes, mouth twisted to the side to hold back her smile.

He lies back down beside her and they stare up at the ceiling for a while. Maybe it should be odd, all this talk about dicks, but it’s just… not. It’s silly and easy and fun.

The thing about Rae is, well the thing about all of this, really, is that he just likes her so much. Just really likes her. She’s so fun to spend time with, even when they’re not really doing much of anything like they had been today. Maybe especially then. He’d gotten it in his head during those first few months at the magazine that she was a bit of a party girl. She’s always laughing and drinking and darting off to the next thing. She seems like she’s always out, always looking for another adventure.

He’d been drawn to her right away, attracted to her magnetic energy and wide open smiles, to her quick laugh and smart mouth. But it’d always seemed clear that there’s no way he’d ever be enough for someone like Rae. She’s bright and bold and busy, and he’s so… bland. How could _he_ ever hope to keep someone like her?

But today… she’d slid so effortlessly into his staid, boring life. It’d felt natural, like she’d always been there, like his life had just been waiting for her to settle into it. Her teasing, her casual touches, her comfortable silences. It’s like he’d never noticed his hollow places until she’d been there today to fill them in. He’d be unnerved by it all if he hadn’t enjoyed it so much.

“You know, for a long time, I thought you had a girlfriend.” Rae’s voice glides upwards into the air before settling on him. He’s still muddling through all these big thoughts and he doesn’t quite get it.

“Wait, what?!” He exclaims, too loud. He softens his voice when he continues, “Why would you think that?”

Rae shifts and the mattress moves beneath him until he’s rolled slightly inwards towards her.

“I dunno.” She chuckles lightly. “You’re quiet, a little removed usually. You don’t come out with us very often. I thought it was because you had a missus at home.”

He’s spinning, his brain throwing up moment after moment of the two of them, now hued slightly differently. All those times she’d leaned away, when her eyes had gone wide. All that flirting at the beginning, worrying he’d been too subtle, worrying he’d been too overt.

He’d always just assumed that she felt like he did, like there was nothing interesting enough about him to catch her.

“Well I don’t.” He stubbornly proclaims..

She snort-laughs, then covers her mouth. “You don’t say? I thought I was just a bonus girlfriend, here to impress your dad with your super masculinity.”

“Ha-ha.” He’s disappointed, though he can’t quite place why. “You’re hilarious.”

Rae gets still and quiet beside him, and sleep starts to creep in around them, warm and heavy. “Just for the record,” he breaks the silence, though his voice stays low and rumbly, “there’s never been a girl in this particular bed before.”

“Really?”

He shrugs, though he’s not sure she can really see. “It’s been a while. I’m a solitary kind of guy.”

It’s foolish, he knows. So much of what’s happening with them today is a mistake. She’s going to leave soon, return to her own flat, her own life, and he’s going to be stuck here, thinking about what might have been, about what _was_ for this brief moment in time. But it’s so simple to reach across the space between them on the mattress and take her hand, slip his fingers between hers, press his palm into the cup of hers.

Rae sighs lightly. “Huh.” She muses, then, “me either. For the record.”

He doesn’t worry about being found out, or what his Dad is going to see, or what will happen on Monday. He doesn’t worry about anything.

He just squeezes gently, smiles into the darkness when she squeezes back.

—

She wakes with a start, jumping slightly when she sees him perching there on the side of the bed. Finn offers a mug and an affectionate half-smile. She rubs at her eyes, pushes back her hair, sits up against the headboard before taking the tea from him. She takes a long, grateful sniff, and then a longer, more grateful sip.

 “What time is it?” She grumbles.

He glances at the clock, and when he answers, it’s quiet and gentle, the kind of voice that eases you into morning. He’s especially good at that kind of thing, transitions. “It’s early still. Not quite seven.” He bites his lip. “Listen, I know it’s kind of out there, but my Dad and I are gonna to church.”

She’s a little taken aback, takes another sip of tea to cover it. He doesn’t wait for her to reply, just looks down at the blanket and barrels on.

“My Nan was big on church. After my mum left, she came to stay with us, to help my Dad. She’d always make us get dressed up and go on Sunday mornings. She’d walk between us, holding onto both of us, proud that we were her boys.” He’s got a faraway smile, wistful and sad. Rae feels an answering ache in her chest and reaches out to place a hand on his knee. He seems to see her then, pulls himself back from wherever he’d been. “When she died, we just kept going. We were used to it, you know? And it was good to be reminded of her. So my Dad and I always go when we’re together. It just seems right.”

She’s not sure what to say, what to do with this version of him. He’s so open, apparently fine with being vulnerable. She’s not sure she knows anyone like that. She sits up a little more, and Finn takes her cup and sets it on the nightstand. His hands flutter around her, over her blanket-covered legs, over her hands sitting on top. He’s not sure if he can touch her, she thinks, and reaches to take one of his hands. The other settles in his lap.

She traces up and down each of his fingers, lets her hands explore the ridges of his fingerprints, the knots of his knuckles. This shouldn’t be allowed, probably, without Gary here to see, but it’s weird not to touch him now, after two days of letting herself lean in to the whole pretend girlfriend thing. It’s only hands anyway, there’s no big deal in just holding hands.

 “Do you go when he’s not here?”

Finn cocks his head to the side for a second before he answers. “Sometimes.” He shrugs.

 “You don’t have to go, if you don’t want to.” He gusts, morning soft again. “You can stay in bed, go back to sleep.”

She’s not sure why this makes her blush, but when she raises her eyes to his, it’s strangely tense. Her chest feels tight, breathless. His hand moves and for a second, she’s sure he’s going to brush her hair back from face, but he only scratches his shoulder. She looks away.

“I’ll go.”

“Yeah?” He asks, hopeful, nearly radiating with gratitude.

 She thinks about brushing it off, about telling him she might as well since she’s already faking everything else. Why not add this to the mix? But that tension’s back in her ribs, and she’s not so sure that he wasn’t asking her. Not fake Rae, not the Rae that’s obligated as his pretend girlfriend, but the real her. The Rae that’s his friend, the Rae who’s made faces at him from her cubicle and played pool with him and talked about nothing over lunch. The Rae who’s sat beside him on his couch and rubbed his back and teased him in the darkness of his bedroom.

She can’t tell what’s real anymore, where the line is. It’s slippery and shifting and she’s not sure about anything. What’s the difference between liking someone and _liking_ someone? How can you tell what’s friendship and what’s romance?

It’s the touching, right? The attraction? No wonder she’s so confused, when all of that’s the pretense, the extra gloss of make believe. They’re friends, just friends. She’s got to hang on to that. If he’d wanted her to be his real girlfriend, he would have asked her. This is fake for a reason. It feels normal and natural and… good because they’re friends, because this is developing what was something of a shallow friendship into something richer, deeper. That’s why it all fits so well. They’re friends.

So as his friend, she turns to him with a reassuring smile. “Of course I’ll go.”

Finn beams at her, and Rae’s heart thumps strangely. Friends.

—

Waiting for her feels like the Leavers Ball, with him standing in his suit, fidgeting with his cuffs, his Dad hiding just around the corner in the kitchen. Finn wouldn’t be at all surprised if his Dad’s got a camera ready, trigger finger itching to record this special occasion. At least he hasn’t got any spots this time, and he doesn’t have to worry about his hands shaking as he tries to pin a corsage on. Though with Rae, she’d probably just laugh at him and it wouldn’t be all bad.

She’s visibly taken aback when she comes out of the bedroom and they’re both just standing there waiting for her like dopes. She leans back on her heels and gives his Dad a worried glance. “Are we late? Why are you guys standing there like that?”

His dad recovers first, sweeping towards her with his arms outstretched. “We’re admiring you. You look beautiful, Rae.”

“Yeah, okay.” She retorts with a roll of her eyes, but Finn can see the flush of pleasure that lights her face. She hugs Gary warmly, despite her protest.

His Dad’s not lying, she does look beautiful, with long sweeps of curls that he’s itching to touch, eyes that look enormous and alluring, lips glossy and pink. Gary scoffs, turning towards him imploringly. “Doesn’t she look beautiful, Finn? Come on, tell her.”

She holds his gaze as he walks forward to give her his own hug. A prickle of nervousness slinks down his spine, but he shoves it down with a warm smile for her. She reaches, almost automatically, to put her hands on his shoulders as his move to her waist. He intends to just hug her, simple and easy, but something makes him hold back for a moment, just to look at her. She’s got some kind of makeup on, different than what she wears at work, and she’s so pretty that he has to swallow.

“You do.” He tells her, and the blush blooms in her cheeks again. He lifts a hand to brush his thumb over the colour, marveling as it darkens. “You always look beautiful.”

Rae’s eyes go liquid, and he has to swallow again, because it’s so so true. Sure, she’s in a dress and lipstick at the moment, but she looked just as beautiful an hour ago with her hair all over the place and eyes swollen from sleep. Just as beautiful two weeks ago when she’d come into work hungover with dark circles under her eyes and a slightly gray cast to her skin, or when they’d all made plans to meet at the pub a month ago and she’d come in jeans and a band tee. She’s always gorgeous and he’s deeply enamored with her but doing his best to hide it.

Or was, until today.

He pulls her into a tight hug so he can hide his face, so he doesn’t kiss her right there in the hallway with his Dad whistling and clicking away. She’s wearing heels, so she’s taller than him and he ends up with his face buried in her hair. It smells heavenly, ripe and sweet. His hand spreads out over her lower back, proprietary. Rae’s creep over his shoulders and around his neck.

When he goes to pull back, Rae ducks in swiftly to press a kiss against his cheek, though she lingers once she gets there. When they break apart, she’s looking down at the carpet, pink and smiling. He takes her hand without thinking, effortlessly.

“Ready?”

They move to the hall and put on coats and scarves. Rae smiles and adjusts his for him, and this is what it would be like with her, he can feel it. Her tucking gloves into his pockets and straightening his buttons, her caring for him like it cost nothing.

They hold hands all the way to the church, their strides even and comfortable. His Dad tells a joke that he forgets as soon as it’s uttered, but it makes Rae laugh brightly. When they walk through the double doors and into the lobby, she stands a little closer, tucks her other hand into his elbow. He tries to offer her a reassuring smile, but when he sees her face, he knows that she’s trying to comfort him instead of the other way around.

He presses a kiss to her forehead by way of a thank you.

They slide into a pew closer to the back, and being sandwiched between the two of them makes him feel warm and tender, slushy with emotion. It doesn’t help when the choir files in and they stand to sing “What a Friend We Have in Jesus,” his Nan’s favorite hymn. His dad wraps an arm around him, pulls him into a sideways embrace. Rae doesn’t let go of his hand, through all four songs, through the sermon and the reprise. She doesn’t let go of him once.

After the service, Rae excuses herself with a squeeze of his hand. He watches her go, and something burns hot and uncomfortable in his chest. When he glances over, his Dad gives him a sympathetic smile and wraps an arm around him.

“You alright?”

“Yeah.” He nods, though a part of him wants nothing more than to turn and bury his face against his Dad’s tie like he used to when he was a kid. “I just miss her, is all. Nan.”

He tries to hide it, but Finn doesn’t miss the surprised look that crosses Gary’s face. His arm tightens around Finn. “Me too, son. Me too.”

They stand side by side waiting for a girl to come out of the bathroom, and it feels like any one of a hundred times they’d done this. Nan’d cluck at them and shoo them out to the car so she could keep talking to her friends without them eavesdropping. Finn clears his throat.

“You’ve never brought her with you before?” His Dad asks abruptly, but not ungently.

“No, this is the first time.”

Gary mumbles a thoughtful noise. “She’s good for you, your Rae.”

“How’s that?” Finn breaks out of his Dad’s arms to face him, amused and a fair bit guilty. None of this is real, so whatever improvements Rae’s supposedly made to him are his own accomplishments instead of hers. But then, he has felt different this weekend, looser, despite all the pretense. Maybe he doesn’t want to know how she’s good for him after all. “You’re not going to try and give me some kind of fatherly advice, are you?”

His Dad laughs. “Oh, no. I wouldn’t dare to give you advice, Finny. What a disaster that would be.”

“Good.” He nods soberly. “You know you’re rubbish at it.”

Gary pulls him into a proper hug this time, laughter rumbling his chest where he presses Finn’s cheek against it. His Dad even kisses the top of his head. “I love you, you numpty.”

—

Finn is apparently the sort of bloke who owns real wine glasses, and not even that, but separate ones for whites and reds. She can’t help but look at him a little differently after discovering this. She and Chloe barely have glasses at all.

It doesn’t help either, that when he’d seen her faltering in front of his ridiculous cupboard full of real wine glasses, he’d come up close behind her, smooshing her against the worktop as he reached up to grab the right ones. He’d countered her stunned expression with a cheeky grin and the whole moment was over almost as soon as it had begun. But she’s stuck on it, lingering there as she sits on the countertop beside him and swirls her wine around in her huge glass- red means gigantic apparently.

“He thinks he’s Italian.” Finn teases, leaning into her to stage whisper. “Look at how he’s smelling those tomatoes, like he can tell the difference.”

She laughs lightly, leaning right back. Finn’s got the hang of it now, the touching. The fake touching, she should clarify. She can’t forget, despite how dangerously great it feels to have him pressed up against her, this is all pretend.

Friends. She’s had to cling to it like a mantra today. Just friends.

“Hey, I am Italian.” Gary scolds without turning around from the cutting board, making a show of sniffing a tomato forcefully. “Remember Uncle Franco, on Pop’s side? Straight out of Italy.”

“Uncle Frank, you mean? He’s from Norfolk!” Finn laughs, and it’s so lovely that she’s got to swallow. He’s so happy, so completely and openly joyful tonight that she doesn’t know what to do with herself. He’s always been good-looking, but like this? He’s irresistible. Lucky for her, Gary is right there, so she can skate her fingers around his wrist just because she feels like it.

Gary glances over his shoulder at them with a grin. He puts down the knife he’s holding, wipes his hands on his apron and holds them up in the air. “I don’t have to cook, you know. I can leave it to you if you want, Finn. It is your flat.”

“No, no!” Finn protests, bubbling with laughter. “I’m shit at cooking, and you know it. I’m sorry I questioned your heritage.”

“Our heritage, my boy. You’ve got the Italian in you too.” Gary turns back to his cutting board, scrapes the tomatoes into a skillet on the cooktop.

Finn sets his glass down so he can slide his hand into hers, shifts so his side is pressed against her firmly.

Rae bites her lip, looks down at their hands. Her head is starting to fuzz pleasantly in the way it only ever does when she drinks red wine, and she can tell that her cheeks are already helplessly flushed. She’s so warm and comfortable in this little kitchen, with these men she barely knows. It doesn’t make any sense.

Finn leans over to nuzzle his nose against her shoulder, presses a kiss that shoots warmth straight through the fabric and muscle and bone, all the way down into the centre of what is her, really her. She lets her head droop down to rest against his.

Maybe it doesn’t have to make sense.

 “Alright, alright, that’s enough.” Gary taunts, and the room is suddenly brighter, bigger. “You know I’m nursing a broken heart over here, right? You guys could cut an old man some slack. You don’t have to be sooo adorable.”

“Shut up, Dad.” Finn throws a teatowel at him, but he straightens up.

Rae moves away from him as much as she can, awkwardly shifting along the worktop. She takes a long sip of her wine, and it does nothing to help with her blush.

“Oh, are you embarrassed, Finny? Is your mean old dad embarrassing you?” Gary makes a mocking pouty face, moving sideways back and forth in front of the stove like a crab.

She can’t help but chortle as Finn hops off the counter and the two of them have some kind of strange play fight that involves head butting and claw hands. Boys in their natural habitat are so bizarre. The fight doesn’t end until the oven beeps loudly, at which point, Finn holds up both hands in surrender.

“Alright, alright! You win this one.”  He concedes breathlessly, grinning widely.

“Damn right I do.” Gary nods, swatting Finn with the towel. Finn bends and starts back towards his Dad.

“Hey hey!” Rae interjects. “That’s enough, you maniacs.”

“But-”

“Finn, the food.” She reminds him. “He’s making the food.”

“Fine.” Finn huffs, coming back to stand next to where, close again. He leans back and slips an arm behind her, his hands brushing up against the back of her jeans.

“Thank you, Rae.” Gary says pointedly, then turns towards Finn. “I told you she liked me better than you.”

“It’s true.” She gives Finn a pitiful face, pats his cheek sadly. “Sorry, babes. Now that your Dad is single, I’m afraid I have to…”

Finn spins around and clamps a hand over her mouth to shut her up. Gary is laughing wildly, even as he bends to take the casserole dish out of the oven. Finn gives her a stern look. “Too far!”

She licks his palm and he releases her with a grimace.

“You’re a terrible girlfriend, you know that?” Finn huffs, nose wrinkling. He drops his hands to rest on either side of her thighs.

“Hey, I told you that before we started.” She laughs.

He leans in closer, and because she’s up higher, his face lines up with her neck. He pushes her hair back with his nose, nuzzling a little. “Man, I like you.” He whispers huskily, breath tickling the little hairs near her ear.

She shoots a look at Gary, who has his back to them. A shiver darts down her spine, and her eyes flutter closed all on their own. Her hand slides up, totally without her permission, and her fingers curl into his t-shirt.

Finn slides the tip of his nose down her neck for just a fraction of a second. Warmth pools in her stomach. It’s the wine, she tells herself firmly. Then he kisses her neck, soft and gentle and tender. It’s a light kiss, almost chaste. Still, Rae’s eyes roll back in her head.

Okay, so not the wine then.

He pulls back and gives her a searching look. She’s not sure if he’s checking to see if that was okay, or if she’s still alive after he’s melted her bones. She feels dazed and befuddled and turned on and half a dozen other things, so she can’t imagine what he sees that makes him smile so cheerfully at her before going to help his Dad with dinner.

She finishes the rest of her wine in one long gulp, doesn’t test her shaky knees by getting down. What was that? He’d kissed her and his dad wasn’t even looking. That kiss didn’t feel like pretend. None of this has felt fake at all today. It’s all confusingly, wonderfully, terrifyingly real.

And it’s almost over. This is the last night. Tomorrow, Gary will catch the train back to Stamford. Tomorrow, she’ll be back in her own bedroom. Tomorrow, Finn will go back to being solitary and untouchable.

She hadn’t planned for it to be like this, to feel like this. She hadn’t planned to gain something in his flat this weekend, for there to be something to miss when she leaves. What will they be when they’re not fake dating? What will she be when she’s not his?

Rae reaches a hand up to rub at her neck. She’s not really pretending anymore, is she?

She’s so good at faking things. She’s used to pretending to be one thing when she’s really altogether another- at pretending to be fine when she’s screaming inside, at putting on confidence when she really feels crushingly insecure, at being fun and silly when she’s actually hurting. But this? She’s not at all sure how to do this.

How do you pretend not to want someone when you’re in the middle of pretending to want them? How do you hide how you really feel when you have to act like you feel exactly that? It’s a mess, and she can’t make sense of it, especially with the clock ticking down faster and faster to the end of all of it.

So, she decides to give it up. She takes a deep breath and hops off the counter.

Why worry about tomorrow? She can handle tomorrow’s problems when she gets there. Tonight, she’s just going to enjoy it while she can. She may never be Finn Nelson’s girlfriend beyond tonight, and while she didn’t know before that it was something she wanted, she certainly does now.

“I’ll set the table.” She announces, letting her hand rest against Finn’s back. It’s only the second cupboard she tries before she finds the plates.

—

The glow from the nightstand carves her into a statue as she stands beside the bed, deep shadows and warm golden relief. She’s wearing a long sleeved t-shirt and little tiny pajama shorts, and she is miles and miles of leg.

He doesn’t speak until she’s slipped beneath the covers. “Hey.”

She turns to face him. “Hey.”

It’s something else tonight, something new. Something that makes the room lighter, makes the air thin and motionless. Like gravity has taken a break, just for tonight, made the press of real retreat.

The cotton of her shorts is insubstantial and warm when he reaches for her. It should feel brave to touch her like that, but it doesn’t. It feels effortless, inevitable. When she looks at him, her eyes are endless and gravity doesn’t apply to them either. He’s weightless inside of her gaze.

She places her palm against his chest, not to hold him back, but to draw him nearer. He obliges, inching across the cool sheets towards her. His hand slips up from her hip into the dip of her waist. She inhales.

“I’m so glad you came.” He tells her. “This weekend has been…” He shakes his head, because what can he say? How can he tell her what this has meant to him? What she means to him?

“Me too.” She breathes, her hand smoothing up, up his pectoral, curving over his collarbone. She watches as she cups his shoulder, swirls her fingers down his arm to his elbow, back up again.

He can’t look away. His own hand glides up too, and Rae breathes in sharply as he grazes her ribs. She’s flushed and her mouth is open and God, he wants. He wants every inhale, every extravagant curve, every flashing glance.

He cups her neck, slips his fingers into the silk of her hair. Rae arches to give him better access, and he almost smiles as he runs his thumb up the column of her throat.

“Finn.” She calls, breathless and airy. He lets his touch drift along the slope of her bottom lip. She shudders and he meets her gaze, makes everything go completely still. He’s cupping her jaw, holding her motionless as his heart thumps gratefully in his chest. How he’s longed to touch her like this.

She licks her lip, and her tongue just barely grazes his finger. Her hand fists in his shirt, and she’s tugging and he can’t do anything, can never do anything, but follow along after her. He lets her draw him in, but he holds her steady just before their lips touch, spins the anticipation out thin and airy like fairy floss. Her skin is soft and flushed, her body warm as it sinks easily into his and she shudders in a shaky breath, a shiver trembling through her. He breathes her name inaudibly once, and then his lips are against hers.

He’s careful to keep it light, to slip his mouth over hers gently, smoothly. She grasps his shirt tighter, but he wants this kiss to say all the things that he might not ever be able to tell her. He sucks at her bottom lip, but doesn’t press in when she opens her mouth, pulls back to skim his mouth against hers.

Rae whimpers softly, sliding one of her legs to curl over his thigh and pull him closer. His hands have escaped his control and slip over the decadent slope of her side, down to the smoothness of her bare thigh and back up again to her ribcage. Rae arches her back into him with a sound that fogs his brain with heat.

He wants her, and he suspects that all that bare leg means he might be allowed to have her, but he doesn’t want this to be about sex. He wants so much with her, and if they have sex now, while she’s still his pretend girlfriend, he’s afraid there will never be a way to go back, to unwind all this mess to essentials. Tonight, it has to stay simple.

He moves away so that he can look at her again, makes space to touch her cheeks, to slow it down. Rae kisses his fingertips as they move over her, and his mouth curves up softly. Her eyes are dark and shimmering in the low light; something tightens in his chest.

“Well.” She says, smoky and warm.

He laughs softly in reply, dipping his head to kiss her neck. She smells so good there. She tastes so good there, peaches and sunshine. She hums softly, and he slicks his mouth up, over her jaw and back to her lips.

They kiss for hours, until everything becomes hazy and languid, until his lips are swollen and numb. He never wants it to end. He kisses her still, tender and gentle, and even after he drifts off to sleep, he dreams of her in his arms.

—

She wakes up early, too early after spending most of the night making out, but she wakes up happy, so she leaves Finn asleep in bed, wraps herself in her robe and goes to look at her swollen mouth in the bathroom mirror. It’s not too bad, it will probably be fine by the time she has to go to work. Her pink cheeks, on the other hand, may never go away.

She’s absently touching her mouth when she goes into the kitchen and starts opening cupboards, looking for tea. The kettle’s out, thankfully, but it takes a while until she finds the tea.

“Good morning, Rae.” Gary says, and she nearly jumps out of her skin. She hadn’t been humming, had she? She’d not even noticed that he was there.

“Good morning. Would you like a cuppa?” She smiles at him, shaking the box cheerfully.

“Sure.” He shrugs, returning to his eggs. Rae busies herself finding mugs, pulling out the milk, pouring hot water. “Milk and sugar in mine please, love.”

Rae looks around for a moment, hoping to find a handy jar labeled sugar, but there’s a whole set of canisters and she’s not sure which it might be. She opens a few until she finds the right one, then fixes his cup and turns to hand it over. Gary’s watching her with a strange expression, eyebrow raised.

“Could you hand me the bottle opener, Rae?” Gary asks mildly, shaking a bottle of hot sauce at her with a smile. “I can’t get this open.”

“Oh, sure.” She turns around, starting to panic a little. If she were Finn, where would she keep her bottle opener? Next to the sink, right? That’s where they keep it at their flat. Nope, not there. She laughs a little, but it sounds strange. “Can’t remember where we put the damn thing.” She mumbles for Gary’s benefit.

He watches her solemnly as she opens two more drawers, neither of which contains what she’s looking for. Finally, she finds it in the same cupboard as the tea, which frankly, is a very stupid place to keep a bottle opener. She turns to pass it to Gary, but he’s got his arms crossed and he’s frowning.

“You don’t actually live here, do you Rae?” He accuses, and she feels like she’s been slapped.

“Uh… what?” She sputters. “I… of course, I mean… why… what makes you say that?”

He frowns at her, gives her that disappointed face that all parents seem to make. “C’mon. I just watched you search the whole kitchen. You don’t know where the cups are, or the sugar. I’m hardly ever here and I’m better acquainted with this kitchen than you are.”

“Gary, I…”

“Why would you lie to me? Why would Finn lie to me?” Gary shakes his head, hurt furrowing his forehead. “I don’t understand.”

She feels terrible. The weekend went off with barely a hitch until she was alone with Gary for five freaking minutes. She should have known she would screw this up.

“He didn’t want you to worry.” She explains helplessly. “He couldn’t afford to come home New Year’s and he didn’t want you to think he was lonely here.”

“Why would I assume he was lonely?” Gary raises his face to her, and his now-familiar easy grin is replaced with deep furrows around his scowl. “I would have given him money to come home.”

Rae shrugs, feeling entirely out of her depth. She thinks about the Finn she’s known this last year, how solemn and quiet he gets sometimes. “I think he is kind of lonely.”

“He’s got you, doesn’t he? He’s got friends. I assumed he was happy. The way he talks about work, about you… anyone would assume he was happy.”

Rae can’t hold back her wince. “We’re… we’re not really dating.”

Gary frowns, his forehead wrinkles increasing exponentially. “You’re kidding.”

She grimaces. “No?” She doesn’t mean for it to sound like a question, but it definitely does.

Gary sits back in his chair, wide eyed. “That’s… shocking. Why would you do that?”

Rae opens her mouth, tries to explain, but what is there to say, really? Why did she do this? Because she was bored, mostly. This was all just a laugh to her until she’d spent time with them both and it’d become… something else.

“I don’t know.” She doesn’t even try to hide the sadness from her voice. “I guess I need to figure that out.”

“I’m not going to lie to you, Rae. I’m incredibly disappointed. You seem like such a sweet, fun, lovely person- who I thought was making my son very happy.” Gary’s eyes droop sorrowfully, but his eyebrows are drawn down in anger, a deep vee over his eyes. “Are you messing him about? Because Finn is a vulnerable person, he gets hurt…”

“No.” She interjects, shaking her head and hand in unison, probably a bit more wildly than is necessary. “It’s not like that. We’re friends, I was just helping him out. He asked me and, I… I didn’t think. I just agreed, and then I met you and you’re so great, and we were all just having such a good time, and I just… I don’t know. I wasn’t trying to hurt anybody. I’m really sorry.”

He doesn’t say anything for a long time, and when she finally brings herself to look at him, his face is still drawn and wounded. “I don’t know what to say. The two of you seemed so happy, Finn seemed so happy. The way he talks about you, has been for ages… How is it possible that none of that is real?”

Rae presses her nails into the pad of her thumb, one at a time, absently bites at her lip. “How, how does he talk about me?”

She’s ashamed of herself for asking, for needing this to be about her. She’s ashamed that her own confusion and fear and desire is overwhelming her concern for this man who has come to be her friend. It’s all gotten so out of control; this lie has dripped down into so much more than it was intended to affect.

She’s even more ashamed when Gary clucks and rocks his head sadly at her. “Oh, Rae.”

Tears burn in her eyes and she looks up to prevent them from dropping. “It started out so simple, you know? Just pretend to be my girlfriend so my Dad doesn’t worry. But you’re not just a Dad, you’re a person. And then it started to feel normal, and then it felt real and I felt… And I just, I don’t know, I didn’t mean for any of this. I didn’t want to feel, I didn’t think he felt, and now, it’s just… It’s confusing. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I lied to you. I like you.”

She’s got her hands tucked into her sleeves by the time she’s finished, and she wishes she could tuck all the rest of herself in, too.

“He does that, doesn’t he?” He sighs, and when she looks at him from the corner of her eye, he’s painted with a sympathetic smile. “He’s so easy to love.”

“I didn’t… I don’t…” She tries, but he cuts her off by coming around the counter and wrapping his arms around her. She doesn’t have a lot of experience with them, but she has enough to recognize this as a Dad hug: stern, fix-it affection mixed with a hint of exasperation.

“It’s okay.” He huffs. She’s not sure if he means it’s okay for her to hug back, or her unexpected feelings for Finn are okay, or he’s accepted her apology, or some blend of it all. She lets her arms go around his back, and Gary reaches a hand to pat at her hair. “It’s okay.”

She coughs as they break apart, allows herself some time to recover with a long sip of her tea. Gary returns to his stool, folding his arms on the counter and looking towards the hallway, where Finn still hasn’t emerged from the bedroom. He heaves another heavy, droopy sigh.

His eyes are still doleful, but the beginnings of a smile dance across his lips when he tells her, “I like you, too. Just so you know.”

—

The walk to work is nearly silent. Well, silent between them at least. They don’t hold hands, though he would, though he wants to. Rae’s got hers tucked deep into the pockets of her jacket. She walks insanely fast, and he can’t for the life of him remember if she’s always walked this fast, or it’s another symptom of this morning’s weirdness.

A deep, pulsing knot of anxiety has settled into his stomach. Rae’s been all stops and starts since he woke up, turning her face to miss his good morning kiss in the kitchen, but sliding her fingers along his arm as she passed by him out of the bathroom. She’d been quiet and tense when the three of them had breakfast, no joking or taunting from her end of the table, but she’d laughed at him when he’d tripped over a boot on the bedroom floor. She’d kissed his Dad on the cheek when they’d said goodbye, given him a bright smile and a heartfelt thank you, but she’d not waited for Finn to wind his scarf on before heading out the front door.

He’s not sure what to make of it, to make of her, but he’s got a sick feeling of dread that she’s regretting what happened last night. And, wanting to make sure he knows it.

His Dad had been stiff all morning too, still and frowning. He’d been caught up in the paper, gruff when Finn had tried to go over the plan for the day with him. It must have seemed like he was fighting with Rae, and Gary’d felt the tension and tried to stay out of it.

It’d almost be better if they were fighting, if they could yell at each other and let out just a few of the millions of things that are going unsaid. If he were braver, he’d pull her into a quiet corner right here two blocks from the office and tell her how much he wants her, how much he wants to take what they had this weekend and stretch it into all the weekends. All the weekdays, too. He’s not brave though.

He lengthens his strides deliberately to keep up with her. Still, she gets to the door first and holds it open for him. He raises his eyebrows as he walks through, and she grins back. In the lift, he stands close to her, too close, just to see what she’ll do. Rae takes a step, putting a careful cushion of space back between them.

There’s a tense moment when they reach their floor, the place where they’ll go in different directions. He doesn’t know how to act, where to put his hands.

“Well.” She hums, rocking back and forth on her heels. “I’ll see you later, I guess.”

“Yeah.” He nods, clearing his throat, scratching his neck. “Uh, have a good day?”

Rae laughs at him before she heads to her desk. He turns, crosses the room and sinks into his seat, pressing his forehead against the desktop with a groan. He’s definitely fucked everything up.

He’d like to turn it all off, put his head down and power through his work, but her laughter drifts across the room every now and then, and when it’s quiet, he can hear the way she taps her pen. When he leans all the way back in his chair just so, he can see The Smiths poster she’s got tacked on the outside of her cubicle. Once, when he’s finally deep into an article, she crosses by his desk on the way to the bathroom and he accidentally deletes half the page. He accomplishes nothing all morning, except maybe growing an ulcer.

At lunch time, when he’s getting ready to head out and collect his Dad for the train station, he goes looking for her. She’s not at her desk, and when he peeks into the break room, she’s doubled over laughing at something scrawny little Danny has said. He looks so pleased with himself. Finn wants to punch him, wants to punch anything.

Oh,God, he’s fucked up so bad. He’s going to have to get a new job.

He tosses his keys on the table by the front door roughly when he gets home, tears his jacket off. “Dad?”

“In here, son.” Gary intones solemnly, and Finn frowns in confusion when he finds his Dad sitting still in the armchair, feet planted and one hand on each armrest. When Finn enters the room, he raises a hand to gesture at the couch. “Have a seat.”

“Are you ready? You don’t want to miss the train.”

“I said, have a seat.” Gary threatens, and Finn’s face turns red automatically. It’s the serious-you-better-listen-or-else-voice, and even though he hasn’t heard it in ages, he instinctively knows how to react. He sits. Gary crosses his arms and scowls imperiously. “Do you want to tell me why you felt like you had to lie to me about your ‘girlfriend?’”

“Shit.” He grunts.

“Yeah, shit.” Gary nods, jaw tight. “Have I done something to make you think you can’t talk to me about what’s actually going on in your life, Finn? Or do you just think it’s funny to lie to me?”

“Dad…” He starts, scrambling to get in front of this.

Gary shakes his head, frowns harder, leans forward to rest his elbows on his knees “Why would you think it made a difference to me if you were dating someone? What have I ever done to give you the impression that you have to pretend to have a girlfriend?”

“You didn’t do anything. I just… I didn’t…” The dad-anger is practically pulsing, and Finn’s finding it hard to make sentences.

“Then what is it, Finn? I’m so… I can’t understand why you would lie to me about this. Why you would need to.” He huffs a deep, wounded breath, rubs his hands over his face.

Finn deflates. “It’s… it’s stupid.” He tries to brush it off, but Gary’s eyes are so dark and hurt that instead, he rushes in. “It just… got out of hand. You didn’t want me to move down here, you know? And I kept insisting that it would be great, and it wasn’t. It was awful. I was miserable, and I didn’t want you to know about it, so I pretended I wasn’t.”

Gary makes a scoffing sound, so he barrels on quickly. “You were asking about friends, and girls and… I dunno, Rae was just the first thing that came to mind. And then you kept asking about her and it’s not like I could tell you that I’d made it up. And it just kept going, and getting worse, and you were always so happy about it, and…” He tosses his hands up in the air. “I don’t know, Dad. I fucked up. I’m stupid and I do stupid things. There’s not some great reason. I just kept digging the hole.”

There’s silence after his outburst, and he doesn’t look at his Dad, because he knows exactly what expression is waiting for him. And when he does look up, there it is, deep filial disappointment.

“I wish you’d just told me.” Gary mutters. “I thought we could talk to each other about anything. We’ve always said that.”

“Yeah, but it’s not really true, is it?” He huffs. “It’s not like you tell me anything about your relationships. What happened with you and Carol? Or how about Mum? What happened with her?”

“That’s not the issue at hand here, Finn. Don’t turn this back around on me.” He shakes a finger, frustration pinking his neck. “You lied. For nearly a year.”

“I know!” It comes out a yell, a stilted attempt to stay angry, to turn this fight around to something else. But he’s not angry, not really. He’s just stupid, and cowardly, and foolish. And sorry. “I know.” He says again, and this time it comes out properly remorseful. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to, I just didn’t know how to stop. I’m sorry.”

“You roped that poor girl into it, too.” His Dad complains, but his voice is quieter and Finn can tell he’s softening.

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“She was practically in tears this morning, and that’s on you.” Gary grumps, eyebrows raised. “You’d better apologize to her.”

“I know. I will.” He promises.

Gary frowns at him for a few more moments, then throws his hands up and stands, shooting Finn an aggrieved grimace and holding out his arms. “Fine.” Finn bites back his smile and wraps his arms around his Dad. “This isn’t over, though. I’m still mad. And I intend to mock you mercilessly for the next decade about this. Tell the neighbors and whatnot.”

“Fair enough.” He grunts into his Dad’s shirt.

Gary pats him on the back firmly, twice, then takes a step back to consider him with a curled lip. “When did you learn to take responsibility and apologize like that? It’s very distressing.”

—

She glances at the clock, again. It’s probably the fifth time in the last two minutes. The numbers don’t change, no matter how many times she looks, no matter how frustrated she gets. 4:58. Two minutes and then it’s time to go.

She rubs her tongue along her back teeth, leans back in her chair to look outside her cubicle. It’s dumb, because if he didn’t come back earlier, it’s highly unlikely that he’d come back for the last two minutes of the day. She’s just going to go home, take a long hot shower and curl up in her bed.

Well, maybe not a long hot shower. A rushed, tepid shower. But the principle is the same.

So what, she’s still got stuff at his flat? He’ll bring it in to work tomorrow. So what she hadn’t spoken to him all day? They’ve gone lots of days without talking to each other. Probably. Just because she can’t remember any right now doesn’t mean there haven’t been tons of them. She’s never had a great memory, anyway.

She’ll go back to her flat, to her bed, and it will all be just fine.

Even if he is mad at her for ruining it. That has to be why he didn’t come back today, because he’d had a big row with his Dad and it’d come out that she’d botched it and Finn is furious. It’s not like it’s completely her fault. Just mostly. There wasn’t any way to know that she’d be a shit fake girlfriend and fuck up the whole thing right at the last minute and hurt everyone involved. How could she have anticipated that?

It’s been a miserable day.

She looks at the clock again, heaves a long, heavy sigh. Five PM. Time to go home and lick her wounds. She tidies up her desk, pulls her bag out of her drawer, pushes in her chair. She looks around one more time, just to be sure. God, she’s pathetic. What if he never talks to her again?

She ducks into the bathroom one last time before the long tube ride home. She looks at herself in the mirror, touches the dark circles under her eyes with the tips of her fingers. _We kissed last night, kissed and kissed and kissed,_ she tells herself, smooshes her lips out into a pout. They’re not swollen anymore, and her cheeks are pale instead of pink now. She’s going to have to start wearing more makeup.

She misses him. That’s the worst part of it all. She knows he’s mad and she knows it’s her fault and she also knows that it’s been exactly eight hours and forty-four minutes since she’s touched him.

When she comes out of the bathroom, there he is, awkwardly shifting from foot to foot as he peeks into cubicle after cubicle, running his hands through his hair over and over. She starts to smile, but bites her lip instead. Maybe he’s left something that he needs, maybe he’s not looking for her. Why would he look for her at someone else’s desk?

Finn straightens up when he sees her, rolls his shoulders, his face falling into a too-casual expression. “Hey.”

“Hey?” She draws it out, lets it rise on the end. She passes by him and walks into her cubicle. “What are you doing here? I thought you’d gone for the day.”

He follows her, stands in the open walkway. She makes a show of pulling her coat off her chair, of realigning it just so, of straightening an already straightened pencil.

“I, uh…” She turns around to watch him scratch his head and shrug. “I came to get you. Are you ready to go home?”

“Home?” She questions, heart thudding heavily in her ears. She forces herself to hold her own too-casual face, only lets her eyebrows raise a little.

Finn watches her, mouth twisted, obviously trying to figure out what she’s thinking. She stays still though she wants to fidget, wants to jump him.

Eventually he shrugs, and then slowly holds out his hand to her. “Yeah, let’s go home. I’ll make you dinner.”

 She’s got a thousand questions. A thousand thousand. She’s dying to know what he wants with her, what happened with his Dad, how’s this going to work? There’s so much to say, so much to discover.

But, more than that, all she really wants is to be back in Finn’s bed in the darkness with his fingers slipping up her side.

She looks down at his extended hand, back up to his face. His eyebrows draw together hopefully. “I thought you were shit at cooking.”

He laughs briefly, takes a step closer. “Well, I’ll buy you dinner then. Order take away. Just, just… please. Come home with me, Rae.”

She hesitates, though she’s not entirely sure why. He’s all she’s thought about all day, and there’s no pretending anymore that she doesn’t want him. Still, she’s stuck there, not quite able to reach out.

“Please Rae.” He breathes, soft and careful. “I’m not ready for it to be over yet.”

She slips her fingers through his.

—

“So, couple of things.” Rae announces later, curled against him in the bed.

He laughs, perfectly content as he runs his fingers through her hair over and over. She’s warm and pliant, and if he’s honest, there’s not much that she could ask for right now that he wouldn’t give. “Okay.”

“Am I still allowed to ask inappropriate questions about your penis?”She props up on an elbow, but doesn’t move any of the rest of her away, so it’s fine. He touches her collarbones languorously. “I mean, I know I’m not your fake girlfriend anymore, but I’d like to keep that one. I still have so many questions about dicks.”

He slips his fingers a little lower, glides them just barely into the curve between her breasts. “As long as it’s not the only thing you’re doing with my dick, that’s fine by me.”

“Finn!” She makes a show of gasping like she’s scandalized, her hand fluttering up to cover her chest, which has turned a lovely shade of rose. “You can’t say things like that.”

“Mmmm.” He ducks his face, presses his nose against the back of her hand until she moves it and he can nuzzle somewhere much better.

“Okay, so secondly.” She mutters, breathless and stuttering, the words tinged with a hint of a moan as he kisses his way up her breastbone. “Um, maybe we should talk about the rules.”

She makes a shuddering gasp when his mouth reaches the hollow above her collarbone, and he smiles against her skin, but doesn’t stop. He kisses, slowly, lingeringly, imploringly, all the way up her neck until he can breathe his reply in her ear. “What rules? Rae, there are no more rules.”

She groans when he sucks on her earlobe, then pushes him away gently. “Finn, I’m serious. This is important. Are we dating? Just messing around? Faking it for the houseplants?”

“You really have to ask?” He takes the opportunity to brush back her hair and run his thumb along her cheek. She bites her lip and he tugs it free. “I was never really faking. I always wanted it to be real.”

“Oh.” She says softly, a smile dancing around the corners of her mouth.

“Is that a good enough answer for you?” His fingers start tracing lazy circles over her shoulder, growing slowly wider. He gives her his best seductive smile.

Rae rolls her eyes. “I guess.”

He lowers his head again, mouth aching to return to her skin. “Is that it then? Can we get back to it, or do you have more questions?”

“Mmm.” She coos as he starts to brush his lips against her jaw. “Just one… What are you going to tell your Dad?”

He pushes her down onto the mattress, positions his body above hers. He shakes his head, and Rae laughs up at him.“Okay, it’s time to shut up now.”

 


End file.
